The present invention relates to a new and distinct cultivar of Viola plant botanically known as Viola cornuta and hereinafter referred to by the cultivar name ‘Halo Lilac’.
The new cultivar originated in a controlled breeding program in Guadalupe, Calif. during April 2007. The objective of the breeding program was the development of Viola cultivars having large flowers with distinctive flower coloration and a mounded-spreading growth habit.
The new Viola cultivar is the result of cross-pollination. The female (seed) parent of the new cultivar is the proprietary Viola cornuta breeding selection coded 20423-12, not patented, characterized by its white-colored flowers with lavender margins and a yellow eye, medium green-colored foliage, and moderately vigorous, mounded-spreading growth habit. The male (pollen) parent of the new cultivar is the proprietary Viola cornuta breeding selection coded 20634-6, not patented, characterized by dark purple and white colored flowers having a white eye, medium green-colored foliage, and moderate to vigorous, mounded growth habit. The new cultivar was discovered and selected as a single flowering plant within the progeny of the above stated cross-pollination during September 2007 in a controlled environment in Guadalupe, Calif.
Asexual reproduction of the new cultivar by terminal stem cuttings since September 2007 in Guadalupe, Calif. and Elburn, Ill. has demonstrated that the new cultivar reproduces true to type with all of the characteristics, as herein described, firmly fixed and retained through successive generations of such asexual propagation.